In fact, what is the Business Model of INTRO?

If it's free to download, how does Serato make any money from it's development? I mean, with ScratchLIVE & ITCH you are paying for the Soundcard/Controller that act as dongles......Serato gets a kick-back from the sales of the hardware. But, if you already own one of the supported Controllers, how does Serato get the kick-back in that instance?

I am confused.

i think that mean that DJ Intro is feature complete

if you want more features you have to upgrade to ScratchLive or to Itch and Serato will get money ;)

Seems strange to develop, and maintain a whole new program with the hopes that they "may" get peeps to upgrade sometime in the future.

Allow me to explain how this works from a business sense.

Because controller support is hard coded into the application, the manufacturer has to pay a licence fee to Serato per unit for that support. So let's say I decided to make a skratchworx controller, I'd need say 10,000 units producing and would pay Serato 10,000 x the per unit licence fee. And should I sell out of units, I'll need more making, thus I'll pay for more licences for the new batch.

For people that already own compatible units, it's Christmas come early as they now get a new world of Serato for nothing. But with the short life cycles of controllers (typically no more than 2 years), Serato will see a steady and sustained revenue from new controller sales. And those controller sales are substantially more than any high end ITCH device too.

I wouldn't however expect to see support appear for old discontinued controllers. That is dead money that doesn't generate sales for anyone, and this is after all business. But the feature set is such that at some point down the line, users can spend more cash to upgrade to different hardware and software, and thus manufacturers make more money still.

So yes, the download - just like ITCH and SLL - is free, but it's the sustained sales of hardware that brings in the cash.

I hope I can bring some sense to what many perceive as a strange move, and that the penny will drop for many about just how smart a move this is. Serato market share is about to increase many fold, as is their revenue. And this is good for all users of their products.

I just visited Skratchworx pior to your reply in this thread, read your article, and now understand the business model....thanks, Gizmo!

Glad to be of assistance. Any other questions?

How about the issue of unresolved bugs present in current software, and despite this, they go and release even more software? I think some people feel that this will not make the maintenance of their software any easier. Serato's reputation for producing stable, reliable software has taken a huge hit among my peers lately because of these issues.

Very.....very......interesting.

I hear you, but that wasn't the topic of this particular thread. I too have made my complaints regarding ITCH/SSL instability not being addressed while they deferred resources to INTRO. However, BPM is coming over the next few days, so who knows, maybe we'll see an announcement for ITCH 2.1 w' Chainable Effects, Lion Support, & Better Stability.

I'll reserve my full wrath until' after BPM ;)

@dj_KaSE - You're quite right of course. And I'm 100% sure that they want to make their other products rock solid stable again as well. But they also have a bigger picture of business sustainability to think about. There has to come a time where they must look forward and safeguard the company for the future, so that they can keep bringing out products. So I guess they've taken a step back, seen what the competition is doing and made decisions based on what they've observed.

I sense a period of consolidation and evolution for Serato. To a degree, they've been a little reactionary to circumstances in the market. Now however, they're building a solid foundation for the long term future of their company. Granted, you're pissed off now, but I think you'll be happier in the long run.

That doesn't help you now of course, but please don't think they're sitting on their hands, eating BBQ and cake while your MP4s currupt and ITCH doesn't install.

Gizmo always lightening the tone... :o)

Just hope that's true!